Many devices are available to capture images for a computer. Computer applications that control individual image capture devices are often provided by the manufactures of those devices. For example, makers of document scanners provide software to enable a user of a computer to scan documents into the computer.
Some image capture devices allow a user to lay an item such as a photograph flat upon a glass scanning bed through which a scanning head of the image capture device shines a light and through which the scanning head takes an image of the item. The image data is converted into binary form and the scanner sends the data to a computer. Some scanners are capable of scanning a subsection of the glass. Such scanners receive identifications of subsections to be scanned from the computer. By scanning small areas of the glass, instead of the entire glass the scanners save and produce less image data. At higher resolutions, the amount of image data required to represent a small subsection of the glass is much smaller than the amount of image data required to represent the entire glass.
Some image capture applications are available that control more than one image capture device. However, such image capture applications do not easily switch between image capture devices.